CNN "Anderson Cooper 360 Degrees" - Transcript

Interview

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COOPER: Congressman Markey, what is your greatest concern right now?

REP. EDWARD MARKEY (D), MASSACHUSETTS: Well, my greatest concern is that, you know, this is very early in the process. We're hopeful.

But we're acting with an abundance of caution, because this pipe has been under an enormous amount of stress over the 87-day period. It's almost like a bone marrow transplant right now. We're in the first few hours. We hope that the operation is a success, but there is now a tremendous amount of pressure on this pipe that it has not been subjected to thus far.

We hope that the pipe can hold. It's thousands of feet long. We hope that no leaks spring as a result of all of this new pressure inside of that pipe. If that's the case, then today is a great day. But I think that we should just give it a couple of more days.

We are doing something right now that has never been done before. We really don't know how fragile the pipe is. We're not sure completely of what the integrity of this pipe is. So, I just think that we should still operate under the assumption that we're early in the process. We hope it is successful, but, right now, we just can't be completely sure.

COOPER: Doug Brinkley, I want to put back up the picture, the live picture from underwater, because it is startling. I think that's an older picture. I want to -- here's the live picture.

I mean, it's startling, Doug, to not see oil coming out of there. What is your greatest concern right now?

DOUGLAS BRINKLEY, PRESIDENTIAL HISTORIAN: Well, I think we have to keep calling it day 87, day 88, day 89, until those relief wells are -- are dug. This is not an endgame here today.

But I can tell you I think the whole country is feeling a great sense of relief. I mean, part of the problem has been a sense of powerlessness. It's been like a national bleeding. We wake up every day with that gusher on our TV screen, and we don't know what to do. Was there ever going to be a solution? What if the relief wells didn't work? Was this going to be oil spilling into the fall and the Christmas season?

There was a lot of uncertainty. And BP had misled people so many times that I think, even with this great, historic capping today, people are skeptical.

But I think we have to keep the focus on the Gulf South, that the wildlife down there is being devastated. We still don't know the damage the dispersants have done. We have just endless amounts of dispersants that were -- were dumped in the region.

And we still haven't had BP properly compensate people. They haven't yet paid the right revenues, enough and on time, for the oil that is being collected and that spilled. So, I think all of this is just -- it's a good day. It's the best of the 87 days. But tomorrow is 88 and 89 until those relief wells are built.

COOPER: Yes.

We are going to have more with Doug Brinkley and Congressman Markey and Billy Nungesser in just a moment. We have got to take a quick break.

The live chat is up and running at AC360.com. Let us know what you think about it. Tell us where you were when you heard the news.

Also ahead: He's been taking the heat for his handling of the spill. What's the White House reaction tonight? Ed Henry has been working his sources. He takes us inside.

And later: all those lifesaving supplies for Haiti sitting on docks, tangled up in customs red tape, while -- while people are still in so much need, 1.6 million homeless right now.

We went demanding answers. Now, as you will see in a moment, we're getting action on the ground in Haiti, some dramatic news from Port-au-Prince ahead tonight.

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COOPER: Live pictures from what we have been informally calling the leak cam. As you can see, there is nothing leaking now.

So far, the capping stack is holding, we presume. So is everything deeper underground, or else engineers would have started venting oil to relieve the pressure. Even if BP is not releasing the information, we would think we would start to see that.

Today's closing of the valves putting enormous strain on the pipes below, but probably relieving some political pressure on the White House, which has taken a lot of fire over the last 80-so days to -- for its handling of the crisis.

Ed Henry joins us now with the White House reaction.

Ed, what are you hearing?

ED HENRY, CNN SENIOR WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: Well, earlier today, Anderson, the president was giving a statement on the South Lawn of the White House, reacting to the fact that the Wall Street reform bill passed in the Senate. But I shouted him a question at the end about these developments in the Gulf. And he told me that he sees this as a positive development. But, as you noted, these tests are still ongoing. So, the president said he doesn't want to get ahead of that. He's planning to make a statement in the morning, before he heads out on a weekend vacation to Maine his family.

Told by White House aides that that's because he's been briefed about this tonight. And he's been told by his senior aides that they are not certain that this is going to hold. They are not certain that 24, 48 hours from now, we are going to know for sure that the oil is still not leaking. So, they want to be very careful.

You noted the political damage. This president has taken a beating on this. I'm told that a couple of days ago, when he met behind closed doors at the White House with some Democratic senators, he said he felt -- in private, he was saying that he was getting some momentum late March, early April, after the health care reform bill was signed into law, but then he said he was hit with these two G's, the Gulf oil spill and the Greek debt crisis.

The Greek debt crisis has sort of stopped the momentum in the economic recovery. And the Gulf oil spill has sort of stopped his political momentum. And so they desperately want to turn the corner on this.

But just a few moments ago, before I came on, I talked again with a senior aide to the president. He said their latest briefings are that they still don't know if this is going to stay with -- with the oil not flowing. So, they want to be very careful not to get ahead of this -- Anderson.

COOPER: Ed, there are a lot of folks down here who had hoped that the president and his family would actually vacation somewhere in the Gulf, kind of sending a signal that the Gulf is open for business, New Orleans is open for business. A lot of these coastal communities, the beaches are open.

Was there ever any thought, instead of him going to Maine, that he would do that?

HENRY: They have considered it. But I can tell you that, you know, they have gotten that question. Robert Gibbs did a couple of days ago at the White House briefing. The first lady was down in the region, where you are. She was in Florida actually on the Gulf Coast a couple days ago and was saying, people should vacation down there.

So, one of my colleagues asked Robert Gibbs, well, then why doesn't the first family go there? The suggestion was they have already made their plans, so they are going to go ahead and go to Maine. They may have other vacation plans in August. But certainly, since they are promoting the Gulf Coast for others, they have gotten that question and a little bit of heat on why they are not going to the Gulf Coast themselves -- Anderson.

COOPER: All right, Ed Henry, appreciate it. Thanks. Back now with our panel, Billy Nungesser, Congressman Ed Markey, and Doug Brinkley.

Billy, how concerned are you that people now around the country, maybe even around the world, are going to see these pictures, say, oh, look, no Gulf -- no -- no oil is leaking and think this thing is over?

NUNGESSER: Well, we're concerned about that. We're concerned about assets being pulled back, saying, well, look, it's stopped. It's not going to come ashore, and then, bam, we get a storm and we're hit with it.

We need to ramp up. We need to keep on the front line, keep the people out there, keep building the berms. They're working. And we're going to see this all come ashore, I believe, for a year or two. We might get long breaks in between, but we know there's a lot of oil out there on the surface, below the surface, and depending on the currents and when that storm hits it right and pushes it into the marshlands, it's going to come. And we better be ready for it.

COOPER: Congressman Markey, on I think it was June 23, you wrote a letter to BP, one of the many letters you've -- you've written to BP, that they haven't really responded to.

This one, you were asking for detailed information about the wellbore, about the -- what they knew about the seafloor, about the status of it. That information is obviously crucially important now. Have they -- and, yesterday, you were saying, look, they haven't responded. Have they responded at all over the last 24 hours?

MARKEY: They have not responded.

And, again, I wrote back there on June 23, so that we could publicly disclose what the integrity of the wellbore is, we could publicly disclose what the integrity of the geology around the wellbore, so that we could better understand.

COOPER: And explain why that is so important.

MARKEY: Well, it's important because this is a lot like somebody out in the backyard putting their hand on top of the hose as the water is coming out. It's going to now put a lot of pressure on the rest of the hose.

And what we need to know is, how strong is the pipe? Can it withstand that extra pressure, as the oil is now backed up? Can the soil, can the rock, can the sediment around the well withstand the additional pressure?

And, so, all of this is key information, which is why I believe the federal government has been wise in ensuring that BP move much more slowly than they had intended on doing. BP really has wanted to shut down this well as quickly as possible, although their incompetence has made it impossible for them to achieve that goal.

But, recently, they have wanted to move more quickly, and the federal government, led by Admiral Allen, has forced them to slow down, so that we don't take something and make the cure actually worse than the disease by having this pipe or the rock formation around this well actually now spring leaks and make the problem even worse than it is now.

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